SAN ONOFRE RESTART ODDS DIM

Panel rules full hearing needed, which could delay or end plans to bring damaged reactor back on line

A federal panel on nuclear safety has called for a full public hearing on a proposal to restart a damaged reactor at the San Onofre nuclear plant, siding in large part with the environmental group Friends of the Earth in an order published Monday.

The Atomic Licensing and Safety Board found that the destructive vibrations among steam generator tubes that have sidelined San Onofre are not accounted for in the plant’s official safety blueprint, known as the updated Final Safety Analysis Report.

An evaluation by Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff of plans to restart the plant at partial power amounts to an amendment of the operating rules — creating the opportunity for public hearings on the proposal, the board found.

The decision by a three-member panel of administrative judges, independent of nuclear commission staff, complicates plant operator Southern California Edison’s efforts build a secure regulatory footing to restart the Unit 2 reactor as costs mount for repairs and replacement power. Unit 3 has more severe problems that Edison says could take years to resolve.

The plant, once capable of powering 1.4 million homes at time, has been sidelined since Jan. 31, 2012, when a small radiation leak helped uncover rapid wear on steam generator tubes carrying radioactive water.

Edison officials deferred questions Monday until they can thoroughly review the order. The utility could appeal the decision to the full five-member nuclear commission, which last year directed the atomic safety board to take up the matter.

Murray Jennex, a former systems engineer at San Onofre for nearly 20 years who now teaches at San Diego State University’s College of Business Administration, said the order likely pushes back a final decision on restarting the Unit 2 reactor until after summer.

“I won’t say this is a death blow to Unit 2, but it does make restart less likely,” Jennex said. “If approved, the additional downtime makes the Unit 2 restart more complex and costly due to corrosion issues from sitting.”

Any delays put additional financial pressure on Edison. CEO Ted Craver recently indicated that without a green light to restart by year’s end, the company might decide to permanently shut down one or both reactors, adding closure costs and a void in the region’s power grid.

Edison and minority plant owner San Diego Gas & Electric have shouldered nearly $700 million in repairs and replacement power costs that they hope to pass on to customers. The California Public Utilities Commission opened a first round of hearings Monday that will help determine who pays for outage-related costs — utility customers or corporate stockholders.

The company has filed a license amendment request to temporarily rewrite safety provisions assuring safe operations over the “full range of power.” Staff members at the nuclear commission have indicated they see no significant hazard in that license change.

Damon Moglen, of Friends of the Earth, said Monday’s order opens the way for quasi-judicial hearings on the full restart plan outlined by Edison, not just the license provision on 70 percent power.

“It is a decisive ruling in our favor,” he said.

The 41-page text of the order highlights uncertainties in the methodology behind restarting Unit 2.

“Edison’s prediction that accelerated tube wear will be precluded by plant operations limited to 70 percent power is grounded on theory that is not yet supported by actual experience,” the decision states, citing a dearth of applicable experimental data.

The plant’s updated Final Safety Analysis Report “failed to achieve its intended purpose and must therefore be changed,” the panel wrote.

If full hearings on the restart are scheduled, it’s unclear how long expert testimony might last.

“If Edison had only agreed to a license amendment hearing last year, one could be fairly far along,” said Daniel Hirsch, a nuclear safety activist and lecturer at UC Santa Cruz. “But they spent all their time resisting it, and now they’re stuck.”

Sen. Barbara Boxer said the order sets “a legal framework for a full public hearing before any final decision on the restart of the San Onofre nuclear power plant is made by the NRC.”

“Given that the NRC commissioners asked the (Atomic Safety and Licensing) Board to undertake this review and given that these judges were appointed by the NRC, I expect the commissioners to follow their lead,” said the California Democrat and chairwoman of the environment and public works committee that oversees the agency.